


In for the Kill

by morgellons



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: AFAB reader - Freeform, American Politics, Anarchism, Angst, Anti-Government stuff, Borderline crackfic, Breaking the Law, Collars, Dangerous sex lol, Dom/sub, Don’t read if you can’t vibe with that lol, Existentialism, Feels, Fluff, I’m trying to heal from Star Wars IX okay...., Jealousy, Moral Ambiguity, Not as edgy as it seems, Other, Pining, Porn With Plot, Praise Kink, Reader-Insert, Robot/Human Relationships, Romance, Self-Indulgent, Shameless Smut, Size Difference, Size Kink, Sub!Starscream, fucking around, good job, human!reader, i don’t know, idiots to lovers, mostly Dom!Knockout, mostly Dom!Reader, mostly gender neutral reader, petplay?, potential polyamory, slow burn?, some canon divergence, tsundere!Starscream, what the fuck, you fuck the robot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 07:21:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22859899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morgellons/pseuds/morgellons
Summary: Adventures of a hopeless college student and their quest to find their way in life, discern meaning from the chaos, and make love to giant robots.
Relationships: Knockout/Reader, Soundwave/Reader, Starscream/Reader
Comments: 31
Kudos: 180





	1. Abandoning Post

The blistering sun bore its unrelenting heat over all that remained unsheltered. The cement reflected a blinding white light, and the plastic tables which your employers somehow expected you to use were charged with a hot static that repelled anything from drawing near them. It was a wonder how Walton Dynamics expected their employees to relish in the bare minimum designated break area, completely disregarding the desert climate in every aspect of its being. Then again, bare minimum was deemed satisfactory when it came to employee wages, thus the utmost care for your comfort was not to be expected. 

Rather, lack of wages thereof. You kicked the vending machine before you as your desired pack of candy teetered on the edges of its hooks. It was all you could afford at the moment on your intern salary. Unpaid intern as you had only recently discovered, that is. Fortunately, you had the gig economy to fall back upon, even in the dingy little town that Jasper was. With another kick, the pack tumbled to the bottom at last. You made a quick retrieval of your candy. 

To properly afford an apartment, gas, college courses, and instant noodle dinners, you made quick use of your silly little sedan and became a Zoomr driver. Most of this work consisted of food delivery, for driving actual people around seemed like a far more intimidating prospect. You wouldn’t have to go through this trouble if you were simply paid for your work at Walton, but “experience” was supposedly a sufficient replacement in the eyes of your superiors. Organizing your coworkers to demand all which you have worked to deserve was nothing short of an idle fantasy; alas, you had no friends.

Keeping yourself occupied amidst the menial, repetitive nature of your weekly schedule was only essential in deterring any oncoming existential dread, which was quick to grow into an all-encompassing beast if you allowed it to cultivate. It was a bottomless pit to which you dared not tread too close, and this sudden recollection of that sinking feeling was quite enough motivation to partake in some aimless wandering for the afternoon. 

You’d be back before dark, and surely nobody would notice your absence— the other employees hardly noticed your presence to begin with. You really did relocate to The Middle of Fucking Nowhere, Nevada to do boring grunt work for free at a leading international aerospace corporation. At least it looked good on your resume. Oh, the things you would do for your resume. 

The Walton facility was on the outskirts of the town, in proximity to the regional military base to which they supplied their products. In one direction was Jasper with its sprawling desert backdrop, and in the other, a treeline to which the rocky, dusty scene gave away. It was the most green you had seen since you had moved here. Any sign of life was a comfort in the barren landscape, and thus it became your new destination.

Your trek came to a start. It was refreshing to abandon your post for the outdoors, but the hot wind and dust you’d occasionally kick up weren’t so pleasant. It wasn’t to say that you couldn’t see the allure of the desert and Jasper’s respective aesthetic value— it just wasn’t the greatest place to live. The small town charm wore off after the second week and air conditioning became a burden on your bank account. 

After walking for some time and emptying the rocks from your boots every so often, you found yourself at the beginning of the forest. You untied your jacket from your waist, using it to dab away the moisture from your forehead. The trees provided immediate shade, much to your relief, and you stumbled beneath them with a single glance spared to the scene behind you. The plain white industrial structure now seemed so small from your place in the shadows— a perfect white mirage, a marble palace in the Arabian desert, and you were T. E. Lawrence seeking solace in an evergreen oasis. 

You shook the thought from your mind. You were not a great explorer, just a broke college student like millions of others. You’d never amount to much, despite the wonderful future the youth had always been promised. Leaving your hometown to live up to the expectations of society— those of becoming a strong, independent, working adult— was enough of a milestone. Alas, the future had been stolen from you, as threats of nuclear war and global pandemics, climate change and modern fascism plagued the subconscious of the populous. The exciting, futuristic tales of fantasy and purpose from your beloved fictional movies were to remain fiction, for the world had carried on into the age of a boring dystopia in which you had no choice but to participate. You were just another slave to consumer capitalism, and there was not a thing you could do to escape it. 

You grumbled a few obscenities to yourself for allowing your thoughts to dwell on such sources of impending doom. The forest was quite a spectacle once you turned your attention away from your anxieties and back to your surroundings. The trees were tall and plentiful, painted with calming shades of deep green. Huge boulders and breaks in the earth formed various bumps and cliffs, which you were careful to navigate. If you did happen to fall to your untimely demise here of all places, it would be because you were indeed in the middle of nowhere more than ever. While you could call for help, the single bar of cell reception would be unlikely to cooperate in a time of need. You shrugged. Members of your generation weren’t supposed to be afraid of death anyway. The concept had become such an unfortunately casual subject that many, including you at times, regarded it as lightly as one would the weather. 

A loud rumble which shook the earth beneath your feet sent you leaping backwards as your eyes darted all over in search of the source of the sound. Perhaps your assessment on the notion of self-preservation was incorrect. In your moment of panic, you managed to knock your heel against an inconveniently-placed rock slab and lose your balance, falling straight on your ass. The wonderfully sloped contours of the forest floor sent you tumbling down and hitting every sharp rock along the way. What only lasted a few seconds felt like an eternity, and when you did reach the bottom, you opted to lay there for a minute or ten. You were horribly disoriented and everything hurt, quite literally. You could feel spots on your limbs stinging, which were sure to be bloody scratches and bruises, though you couldn’t muster the energy to check just yet. 

Reluctantly, you pulled yourself to your feet with a groan. Getting back now would be little short of a horrible experience. You hobbled around, trying and failing to get some sense of your bearings. Now you were lost completely. You retrieved your phone from your pocket in hopes it would provide you with any form of directions back. In the reflection of your screen, something shifted. 

You whipped around to face an enormous creature. The eyes that stated you down glowed an angry red beneath a lengthy, sharp horn. Its unshapely teeth shone with a metallic gleam, as the rest of its body did, though scuffed and oxidized in many places. The breath caught in your throat as you hesitantly took a step backward. The creature let out an earsplitting howl. You whipped around and sprinted for your life, against the complaints of your aching body. The adrenaline managed to drown out much of the pain as you bounded over fallen branches and faults in the ground, eyes fixed on the path ahead of you. 

A gust of wind pushed you aside as something shot straight past you. You yelped as you landed on a sore spot in your side. Already stumbling up to a stand, you were almost forced back down again with the blinding blast of an explosion. Only louder than it was a final shriek of defeat as you watched billowing smoke pour from the now deceased animal’s— robot animal, you now realized— shell, which was now stained with a blue fluid that pooled around it. 

With your eyes wide and lips parted, you stared silently at the scene. Only moments earlier were you bouncing between thoughts of the menial and the existential, and now you were left thoughtless and speechless in the midst of a transcendentally bizarre and terrifying experience. 

“Well, human? Do I not deserve a ‘thank you’ at very least?”

As you turned to the voice behind you, you immediately figured you must have accidentally inhaled something really quite special— and especially illegal— in those Walton bathrooms. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I joined this fandom a month ago and I am already vibing. >__>


	2. That Which is True

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whatever you were getting yourself into, it was bound to be better than most else’s ordinary, menial, paycheck-to-paycheck suburban life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope everyone is doing okay! Stay safe and enjoy this chapter. <3
> 
> Check out the links in my profile too if you want to talk (about anything)!

Something wasn’t quite right here. You stretched your hands out, then flipped your palms forward and brought them up to your face. They looked like perfectly normal, average hands as far as you could see. Even so, your senses had most definitely betrayed you as what appeared to be a clearly unearthly being stood just ahead. 

“Uhhhhhhh...“

“Surely you are capable of saying more than _that_! You are supposed to be an intelligent life form, are you not?”

He— or at least, you assumed it was a he judging from that low, sultry voice— shone a steely grey with scarlet accents at the many sharp edges that adorned his slender frame. Large wings jotted out from his back, and between two gleaming red optics which narrowed at you with indignation sprouted a tall spine, reminding you of a funky looking cockatiel. And as your scrutinizing gaze lowered— 

_Heels?_

“God _damn_! You are one hell of a hallucination,” you gasped as a huge smile spread across your face. 

“What?” He scoffed, with nearly the same amount of disbelief as you had expressed. “I am most certainly _not_ a hallucination!”

“Then what are you?” You asked, and immediately regretted your poor word choice. Hopefully it did not come off as particularly offensive. You shook your head. “— _Who_ , sorry.”

He looked briefly puzzled before he proclaimed, “I am Starscream, former air commander, and once second-in-command to the Decepticons. Though now, I pledge myself to no one.”

“I have _no_ idea what that means, but cool!” You grinned. 

Starscream looked pleased with himself, returning the grin— though it was far more patronizing in relation to your befuddled one. 

“...Though, uh, I can’t really say I’m thoroughly convinced that I’m not totally zonked out right now,” you continued with a shrug. 

Starscream groaned. “Is _this_ enough to convince you?” He extended a clawed finger and jabbed you in the stomach. 

“Woah,” you gasped, falling backward and landing in the dirt again to your dismay. You heaved yourself up and rubbed at the spot on your torso. 

“Hey, that kind of hurt!” You huffed, crossing your arms with a frown. “Wait a minute... That _did_ hurt!”

“Are you certain it did? You don’t perhaps require _further_ assurances?” He said smugly, flitting his claws at you a bit too close for comfort. 

“Yeah, no, I think I’m fine,” you chucked weakly. “What are you doing out here in the middle of nowhere, then?”

“I could ask the same of you, human,” he scoffed. 

You shrugged. “I was bored— and, I have a name, you know! And it’s not ‘human’.”

“Is ‘fleshling’ more to your tastes?” 

“Nevermind, let's just go with ‘human’, then,” you winced. Fleshling sounded as if it belonged in borderline slur territory.

“Regardless, my presence here is none of your concern,” Starscream said, waving a servo at you. “Now leave and speak of this encounter to no one.”

“Hmm… so either you quit, or you were fired,” you concluded.

“I— _what_? I was not _fired_ ,” he spat. “Don’t you have someplace to be?”

“Not really,” you answered simply. “Hey, you’re bleeding!”

You pointed to a spot at his waist where the same bright blue you saw earlier dripped from a wound in his silver plating.

“Did you not think I was aware of that?” He seethed. “Those wretched Insecticons have done nothing but torment me since they’ve revealed themselves, no thanks to Airachnid. That one was giving me particular trouble— you made for _excellent_ bait.” 

“Uh, thanks? Anyway, do you need help?” You offered. 

“Help? From the likes of _you_? Absolutely not,” Starscream jeered, nearly offended by your proposal. “Besides, I already have help on its way, so go on back to where you came from.”

“Fine, then.”

_At least, I’ll try._

You brushed away the remaining dust from your clothing and started off in the opposite direction. It was a beautiful spot, if not a bit ominous now as the sun approached the horizon and the wooded land darkened. The steep slopes of the forest floor proved to be challenging to climb after several exhaustive attempts. Several sore spots from your earlier fall still ached, and the mounds of rock below you didn’t make for another fall to be a pleasant thought. 

After some walking, you came to realize you weren’t even sure where you had ended up during the period of time in which you lay on the ground. Nothing looked especially familiar, and you hadn’t been exactly taking note of your surroundings at the time. You circled around back to the outcropping, your efforts having been futile. 

Starscream stood in the same spot where you had left him. This time, he sat with his back to the rocky deposit behind him, an arm slumped over the injury in his side. His gaze was cast off to the side, dejected and not particularly focused on anything. You approached him slowly. 

“Are you _sure_?”

Starscream just about jumped at your sudden appearance, quickly regaining his composure with a frown as he peered down at your tiny figure. “ _Yes_ , I am sure. How could you possibly help me? Now leave— I won’t ask you again.”

“Well you see, I work at Walton,” you began unenthusiastically, pointing again at the laceration that he now covered up. “I could easily fix _that_ up with the right tools.”

“Hmm... Go on,” he said, intrigued. 

“I’m an intern. I could just steal, I guess. It’s not like they notice stuff going missing. I already stole a coffee maker, a stapler, some pens... A huge multinational isn’t going to miss one welder,” you shrugged. “It _really_ doesn’t look like anybody is coming, but if you say so...“

“Wait—“ he interjected, just as you began to step away. 

You raised an eyebrow. It appeared your assumptions were correct. “Yes?”

“Perhaps… you could be of use,” he said lowly and with considerable hesitation, as if he was talking to himself rather than to you. 

You waited patiently for your totally-not-hallucinated giant pointy robot to make up his mind. His optical ridges were knitted together in thought, then he turned to leer at you in what made to be a rather intimidating air. 

“Does your company not supply to the human military forces?” He inquired coldly. “How do I know you won’t rat me out?”

“Psh. Maybe I would if they paid me enough to care,” you dismissed, though you were trying to hide a sudden bound in your nerves. “I was bored, and now I'm _not_ so bored, and an opportunity to remedy my boredom isn't a thing I tend to pass up.”

“In that case, I accept your offer,” Starscream acquiesced with a flourish, of there ever was such a thing. “Well, human? What are you waiting for?”

“Now that’s just the thing,” you sighed, pulling your phone out for the time. “They’re closed now, and it’s getting dark. Plus, I’m tired, and I’m also lost!”

“Ugh. Fine then,” he grumbled, then rose to his feet and gestured at the smoking corpse of the Insecticon. “Where there’s one, more are guaranteed to come around. Follow me.”

Whatever you were getting yourself into, it was bound to be better than most else’s ordinary, menial, paycheck-to-paycheck suburban life— and in spite of all that you didn’t yet understand, you were sure this much was true. 


	3. A Cosmic Disturbance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was remarkable how quickly you were subject to teasing. It seemed as if everyone managed to get a kick out of it.

After spending a little under an hour trudging through the forest following Starscream, it felt as if your legs would give out beneath you. In addition to the debilitating tumble you took earlier and the fact that you had allowed yourself to become drastically out of shape as of late, his walk covered a lot more ground than that of a human’s, and thus you were forced to maintain a steady jog nearly the whole time to keep up. Your head throbbed and you felt slightly nauseous, though you weren’t entirely sure if it was simply from too much time spent in the sun. You paused to catch your breath, leaning your entire body weight against the nearest tree. 

“Wait— slow down,” you heaved. “Just give me a second.”

“Slow down? This is no time to slow down!” Starscream shouted, whipping around to face you. “Besides,  _ you’re _ not the one leaking out your literal life force!”

“Short legs!” You hissed, shoving yourself off of the tree and stomping forward. You pointed at your legs unceremoniously. 

Starscream's optics narrowed. “I see nothing wrong with your legs, human. They appear to be standard for an individual of your age and—“

_ “Relatively _ short!” You huffed, rolling your eyes. “You know what I mean. And there’s a good chance I’m concussed too!”

“I would very much appreciate it if you would stop your whining,” he grumbled. Talons shot towards you, and before you were allowed a moment to react, they wrapped around your midsection and pulled you up into the air. 

“Hey, what the hell?” You gasped. The view of the forest floor, some twenty feet below you, was almost as jarring as that of being held at eye-level with the mech. His disparaging red gaze bore into you, and you briskly averted your own after suddenly feeling both incredibly awkward and incredibly vulnerable.

“Ugh, what is it now?” Starscream growled, his wings pressing together in frustration. You felt his talons close tightly around you in a quick squeeze. 

“What was  _ that _ for?” You frowned, managing to free your arms as you strained against his grip. “You can’t just pick me up like that— you could have dropped me!”

“Would you rather walk?” He asked bitterly. 

You squirmed around in attempts to get more comfortable whilst avoiding the sharp tips of his talons, then paused, thinking for a moment. “Hmm…”

Whether you ran the risk of going splat on the floor or having a couple of organs skewered like a kabob, anything was better than jogging for hell knows how much longer. 

“Nope!” 

“Then quit squirming,” Starscream said, tightening his grip to hinder your movements. This promptly knocked some of the wind out of you.

“Well maybe I would if you didn't have to squeeze me like that!” You exclaimed. The pressure didn’t feel so great against your many forming bruises, nor did you particularly enjoy acting as a living stress ball. 

“Now, now, you wouldn’t want me to drop you…” he taunted in a fakey, sickly sweet tone. 

Starscream let his hold on you loosen, and you nearly slid right off towards the ground, most definitely falling to your death if you had not landed in the cupped palm of his other hand. Quickly scrambling to regain your balance and presumed safety, you clung to the nearest finger, to which they all promptly closed around you again. You looked up to find Starscream wearing the worst shit-eating smirk on his face that you had ever seen. 

“That was not funny,” you groaned, tugging your arms free again and folding them to rest your head upon. Unfortunately, there was no possible way to hide the pounding of your heart in your chest nor your uneven breathing from him. Still, you forced the straightest face you could muster in hopes that you could maintain at least some air of tenacity. 

“Not even a little?” Starscream smirked, holding you out in front of him like a child would with a doll as he walked. You found that, no matter how much you tried to look in the direction you were moving, it was just out of view, and he could easily observe your change in emotional reaction clearly from the way in which you were angled. 

Soon, the slow rocking of his walk and rustling of trees became far less jarring, and instead, you began to feel a bit sleepy. The day had mostly been uneventful until an hour or so ago, and between showing up to work at six in the morning and getting attacked by a flying robot beetle— only to run into yet another robot, this time with an awfully colorful personality— you’d say that it was about time to catch a well-earned break. 

The forest’s gentle night breeze provided some much-needed relief from the heat of the day. Now that the sky had faded to black, aside from the soft twinkling of stars, there was no longer any bright light left to assault your eyes, which became sensitive with the pain of your headache. If you were a little less hungry or dehydrated, you would almost call it relaxing. The factor of “almost” remained due to the entire nature of getting carried away to hell knows where by some giant metal prick who happened to take care of your assailant, who you supposed was also a giant metal prick for chasing after you for no foreseeable reason. There must have been some kind of cosmic disturbance in the fabric of reality in order for you, the unpaid intern, the poor college kid, the Zoomr driver, to get roped into all of this, but then again, things were hardly ever “right” in the universe.

You were jolted back to the present when an unpleasant thought crossed your mind. 

“Starscream?”

“What?”

“You’d  _ better _ not drop me,” you hissed, fully aware that you were nowhere near as formidable as you tried to sound. 

“Frightened, little human?” He asked with a devilish grin. 

It was remarkable how quickly you were subject to teasing. It seemed as if everyone managed to get a kick out of it. You were tempted to tell Starscream to shut up, but you were certain that goading a reaction out of you was exactly what he wanted. You wouldn’t allow him such satisfaction— not to mention that being a hardass rather than rolling with the punches this time around wouldn’t be the safest choice. 

“Uh, kind of? Not so much of you, just… breaking all the bones in my body at once doesn’t sound so awesome,” you sighed with a comical flatness.

“I have already spared you from certain death once, haven’t I?” He said smoothly. “You humans are such fragile creatures. Without having evolved adequate protective anatomy, it is only natural to be fearful of the numerous threats to your own mortality.”

“Maybe for  _ some  _ humans,” you snorted. “Death itself doesn’t scare me. Just the pain of having to live in this flesh prison. Oh, and clowns too.”

“Interesting…” Starscream said after a moment of silence whilst mulling over your words, which you were sure were unexpected. Blame your endless charm. 

You were not sure how to continue the conversation, and he made no efforts to either, and so the awkward silence began to manifest in its graceless weight. 

It was difficult to see your surroundings now that the night was approaching its darkest hour, and you wouldn’t try too hard to do so either. The pressure in your head still left you miserable. However, as the forest began to give away to bare rock, the light of the moon provided you with a better picture of your current location. Plateaus that appeared black against the surprisingly gorgeous, deep indigo sky jogged up left and right. There must have been hardly any light pollution out and around Jasper, and you could make out every constellation clearly. 

Starscream finally turned you to a position where you were able to look forward as he slowed to a stop. Jagged spikes totally unnatural to the landscape sprouted from the rubble of a collapsed rock face. Bathed in the moonlight was a colossal vessel, larger than anything man-made you possibly knew of, that now lay confined to the earth. 

“Welcome to the Harbinger,” he said proudly. 


End file.
